


A Single Step

by Elizabeth Culmer (edenfalling)



Category: Homestuck
Genre: Blood and Injury, Character Study, Depressing, Fifteen Minute Fic, Gen, Injury, Isolation, Loneliness, Pain, Pre-Sburb, Secrets
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-11-06
Updated: 2014-11-06
Packaged: 2018-02-24 07:17:21
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 678
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2572928
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/edenfalling/pseuds/Elizabeth%20Culmer
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Jade can make things be fine on her own.  She can!  But sometimes it gets hard.</p>
            </blockquote>





	A Single Step

**Author's Note:**

> This ficlet was inspired by the 11/2/14 [15_minute_ficlets](http://15_minute_ficlets.dreamwidth.org) word #210. It has been slightly expanded from the version on my journal.

Jade lies very still on the beach for a while. She concentrates on breathing, holds each gulp of air inside her lungs for a count of three before letting it rush out between clenched teeth. She watches high, puffy clouds move slow and purposeful across the sky. She lets the pain ebb and flow like the endless shush of waves lapping over sand and gravel.

Eventually she tries to sit up again.

Her right arm and shoulder and hip ache bone-deep, and she knows she's going to have amazing bruises for the next week or two. She also knows it's going to be really hard to move tomorrow if she doesn't get back to her house, take some aspirin, and maybe lie down in a bathtub full of ice cubes for a while.

She's also bleeding -- nothing deep, but her shirt and skirt are torn and even under the intact fabric, her skin is scraped raw and oozy. It looks like Bec's steaks before she irradiates them. She wonders, for a dizzy moment, if she could fix this by irradiating herself -- it sure stops the steaks from leaking! Maybe she'd even get superpowers, like Bec or all the heroes in comics and cartoons.

But no, that's silly. Superheroes and magical girls don't exist. Jade lives in the real world, where irradiation has real effects. She knows she has to live at least to John's thirteenth birthday. She'd rather make it there without giving herself cancer along the way. Besides, she has a lifetime stockpile of cute bandaids -- Grandpa was very thorough about medical supplies.

Slowly, she levers herself to her feet, good hand resting on the same cliff she just fell off of. Grit cascades from her clothes and hair, and she realizes there's dirt and sand ground into her skin. She'll have to douse herself with hydrogen peroxide after she washes, to kill all the little infections just waiting to invade her blood and body. That is going to hurt.

Well, at least the whole thing will make a funny story to tell to her friends in a couple days. Rose will make up elaborately ridiculous conspiracy theories about the Lovecraftian lure of the ocean and Jade will pretend to believe every word. John will tell stupid jokes and distract her with his latest terrible attempts at computer programming. Dave will make even more stupid jokes and commiserate about honorable war wounds, like she's an action movie hero in training.

They'll never have to know how much she envies them all for having a mom, a dad, or a brother around to patch them up when they're in trouble -- or even just be there, breathing, in the same house. Bec does what he can, but he doesn't have opposable thumbs, and dog kisses aren't the same as curling up in one of Grandpa's hugs and feeling his voice rumble deep in his chest when he told her she was his perfect little girl and everything would be fine.

Jade can make things be fine on her own. She can! But sometimes it gets hard.

"Bec?" Jade calls, trying to shout without moving her ribs too much. "Bec? Hey boy, can you take me home?" He wasn't around when she left the house this morning, and he obviously didn't see her fall -- he would have zapped her to safety long before she hit the ground, if he'd been here -- but he can usually hear her if he's within a few miles.

He doesn't appear. He must be off the island altogether today. He does that sometimes -- vanishes with no warning -- and he always brings back the strangest dead animals as trophies. She's reconstructed and stuffed a few for display -- they fit right in with Grandpa's collection, and she likes to pretend that he's still adding to it himself. It's a threadbare trick, but it almost works, and almost is better than nothing.

"Bec?" she calls one last time. No answer. She's on her own.

Jade sighs.

It's a long way back to her house. She'd better start walking.


End file.
